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I use Access (on my machine) almost daily with ODBC drivers to connect to MySQL databases (on the host server). It makes for quick viewing and updating of data.

You could use this to, say, import an Excell spreadsheet, perform some filtering, renaming etc. and populate, update, delete from or append to the MySQL database. I have macros in Access run through various steps with 1 click.

I found it just makes some of the little in-between steps easier.

There are, of course, methods using PHP and ASP to do the above completely server-side, but if you are not that far along in your programming, something like this could help.

in this industry, i say soak up whatever learning your brain can handle!

since i've left college i think i've used more of what i learned in my office courses then i did my networking but the networking knowledge always comes in handy for pitching my two cents in discussions.

there's always a use and home for everything. what will drive what technology you actually implement is the requirements of the projects you're working on. pay more attention to the database concepts as opposed to the one application you're learning because that knowledge transfers from application to application.